Ordinary PR or a good deed: why Russian Railways changed the movement of trains for the sake of one schoolgirl
Since February 1, the St. Petersburg - Murmansk train has had a new stop at the Poyakonda station. Only two passengers get out and get in here: 14-year-old Karina Kozlova and her grandmother Natalia Viktorovna get home from school.
Poyakonda is located in the very south of the Murmansk region. In simple terms, this is a bearish corner with a gradually dying village. In winter, no more than 50 residents remain in it, most of whom work at the MSU biological station 15 kilometers from the village on the shore of the White Sea. Among its employees are the parents of Karina Kozlova, the only child left in the Poyakonda.
For decades, village children went to school by train to Knyazhaya station, from where they were picked up by a school bus. He was taking them to a school in the village of Zelenoborsky. The whole journey took about an hour and a half. There is even a special person in the village to accompany children to school and back — just Karina's grandmother Natalia Kozlova, a former kindergarten teacher.
The St. Petersburg — Murmansk train stops at Knyazhaya station just after school, at 15:51. To get to Poyakonda, children and their accompanying person had to buy tickets to the Polar Dawns station. After all, the stop in Poyakonda has always been technical (for delivery to the place of work of railway workers).
Since December 1, the technical stop was canceled, and Karina had the only opportunity to leave the Princess by train, which departs at 19:10. And this means that the girl would come home closer to nine in the evening. Considering that Karina has a morning commuter train at 7:39, the child simply would not have time for homework and a full rest.
At the request of the schoolgirl's mother, the administration of the Kandalaksha district appealed to the railway workers.
The railwaymen also went to meet Karina, appointing an additional stop for a long-distance train. Only two commuter trains run between Knyazhaya and Poyakonda stations. Karina goes to school in the morning. But the return train goes too late, which is inconvenient for a schoolgirl. At the same time, the issue of the appointment of an additional train is under the jurisdiction of the subject of the Federation, that is, the leadership of the Murmansk region.
Every Saturday Karina's grandmother goes to Kandalaksha. There she buys tickets for a week for herself and for Karina. The cost of the most budget option, a reserved sideboard, is 277 rubles for Natalia Viktorovna and 138 rubles for Karina. These expenses are compensated by the school, that is, the state budget. For comparison: a trip by train would cost 88 rubles for two.
Keywords: Railway | Murmansk | Trains | Russian railways | Schoolchildren